View full sizeBeytan ErkmanAshleigh Di Lello and Ryan Di Lello are among the featured dancers in "Burn The Floor," a ballroom dance showcase that features so much hair product and body oil that you wonder if the folks at BP are bankrolling the production

The touring ballroom dance extravaganza "Burn The Floor" is unapologetically flashy. It's two solid hours of sizzle with enough electricity to power a suburb or two, and its cast of 20 dancers are remarkably fit and good looking, with curves and muscles in all the right places.

And these aren't just beautiful people. They are champion dancers who have competed around the world, and the experience shows in their precise execution of intense choreography that includes the full range of ballroom dance styles: mambo, rumba, cha cha, foxtrot, tango and the waltz.

So why was I so bored during most of Tuesday night's opening of the production's one-week run as part of the Broadway Across America series? The problem is "Burn The Floor's" relentlessly frenetic pace. From the start, the dancers move like lightning and never let up, changing partners so often in numerous ensemble numbers that it's difficult for the audience to connect with any of them. Adding to the confusion are the show's flashing lights, mirrored balls and clouds of artificial smoke, which create sensory overload that quickly becomes exhausting. By the time some slower dances are introduced in the show's second act, it's hard to pay attention.

But try, because there are a couple of moments of real beauty that make up for hyperactivity of the rest of the evening, most notably "Burn for You," a lush duet between Anya Garnis and Pasha Kovalev, two of the show's noteworthy stars and veterans of TV's "So You Think You Can Dance." In the course of the drawn-out rumba, Garnis displays both vulnerability and passion, while Kovalev shows plenty of strength through a series of difficult lifts and dips.

Part of what makes this number stand out is how stripped down it feels compared to everything else. Garnis is clad in a simple black dress and a white dress shirt, and Kovalev is in ratty jeans and a muscle T-shirt. Instead of focusing on the wardrobe, you can bask in the wonderful movement. It's stark simplicity compared to the cavalcade of ruffles, sequins, tassels and organza in the other dancers' costumes, which look straight out of RuPaul's workshop.

The other problem with "Burn The Floor" is its canned music. With the exception of two percussionists and a couple of marginal singers, the music is prerecorded and blasted over the audience at a brutal volume, as if to compensate for the loss of energy that a live orchestra would have provided. The only thing that breaks through this wall of sound are the handful of very vocal fans at the back of the auditorium, who whistle and shout out dancers names with such bizarre enthusiasm that you wonder if they have been planted by the company to drum up excitement. The real way to do that would be to dial down the show's octane, giving the dancers and the audience a chance to catch their breath.